intro – hex culture

August 22, 2018June 26, 2019 jacinto adventures, amateur hour, demon, encounters, intro, is this gonna work, magic, monsters, occult

katabatic age

Shin Megami Tensei/Annihilation/Stalker citycrawling mashup modeled after Pearce’s Troll World.

// THE NEW AGE

In the depths of the environmental and resource crisis of 20XX, the discovery of a fifth esoteric phase of matter, upon which the laws of physics act weakly but the principles of perception and desire act strongly, promised a path to a better future. Wonderful machines and miraculous technologies, new cities clear of the rising water, humanity’s eyes once again turned to space, all with a price that did not reveal itself until too late. As esoteric substances filled the oceans and esoteric particles filled the atmosphere and esoteric fields tangled with the Earth’s own, all the shadows of the human mind, nightmares, rumors, figures from the old stories, took form and will and pried apart civilization. This new technology did not bring a Golden Age, or an Age of Humanity, but an age of dreaming deep without waking, an age of drowning in the collective unconscious, a Katabatic Age.

from Akira

// THE KATABATIC ZONE

The heart of the end of the world, where esoteric pollution is strongest. A mutating mirage-city build from the dreams and memories of its dead inhabitants, sometimes as clean and new as it was in its heyday, sometimes dilapidated and vine-chewed, its dimensions expanding and contracting so that circumnavigating it might take a week or a year or forever. It is occupied by dream-beings, eidola created by the city’s dead inhabitants: nightmares given flesh, heroes and monsters from the old stories, saints born from the prayers of the dying, archetypes aggregated from a billion human minds, kaleidoscopic psychic artifacts that corrode reality just with their presence. Rumor has it that in the deepest and strangest parts of the Katabatic Zone, there are eidola as intelligent and coherent as humans, who plot against each other and the humans who made them. The one certainty and constant of the Katabatic Zone is that a great deal of money can be made by conducting expeditions into its depths–information, instrument readings, and esoteric substances taken from the Zone are all extremely valuable on the black market.

// CUATROS SANTOS

A small city living in the corpse of a big one. Bright paint on old plaster, new plaster on old cinder block, new cinderblock on tired foundations. Neighborhoods sprung up beneath orphaned overpasses, jury-rigged locomotives coughing diesel smoke as they follow routes that once belonged to electric monorails, pickup trucks and motorcycles blast down cracked highways that once carried thousands. And looming above it all, from the corners of the city, the four colossal namesakes of Cuatros Santos, skyscraping eikons forming an esoteric mechanism that just barely keeps the city from collapsing beneath the weight of so many human minds.

from Dorohedoro

// CHARACTERS

Step 1: Roll or choose your background and make note of your favored attribute and starting skills.

job	preferred attribute	starting skill
employee	appeal	bullshit, linguistics
gearhead	intellect	engineering, computers
PI	physique	athletics, streetwise
delinquent	speed	driving, larceny
esper	psyche	mantia, science
merc	combat	firearms, first aid

Step 2: Roll 2d6+6 for your favored attribute. For everything else, roll 3d6 in order. Attributes are Appeal, Intellect, Physique, Speed, Psyche, and Combat.

Step 3: Max HP = 6. Make a Psyche/Mantia check. If you succeed, you have 1 Nous Die.

Step 4: Determine starting gear. You start with five items a competent shoplifter could get out of a Walmart and a random weapon. Italicized weapons can be hidden, bolded weapons require two hands. You can find armor and more gear on your misadventures. Guns are available, but illegal and hard to find.

roll	weapon
1	machete [d6/d6]
2	sword [d8/d6]
3	baseball bat [d4/d8]
4	switchblade [d4/d8]
5	hairpin [d4/d6]
6	chef knife [d6/d6]
7	mall sword [d4/d6]
8	crowbar [d6/d6]
9	signpost [d8/d6]
10	bicycle chain [d6/d6]

from Michiko and Hatchin

// SHADOW SCIENCE
Mantia is the shadow-science manipulating esoteric phenomena and entities. If you have a Nous Die, you can roll to start with one random Mantic trick. Mantia is extremely illegal in Cuatros Santos, but you can learn Mantic tricks from samizdat manuals and cooperative eidola. If you don’t have any Nous, imbibing (and surviving) esoteric substances, surviving eidolon attacks, spending time in esoteric fields all might give you some.

from Toujin Kit of Genius Party anthology

1. Summon
Instantiates an eidolon of [dice] levels or fewer you have made a contract with. You can dismiss it at will unless it has failed a Morale check since you last summoned it.

2. Apotropaic Tone
Sing a low note note bearing a repulsive polarity, requiring eidola to make an Aptitude check to get within [dice] yards of you. Lasts for as long as your voice lasts. Eidola that succeed their check can ignore the tone until the next time you use this ability.

3. Beckoning Tone
Sing a low note that bears a compelling polarity, requiring eidola within [dice] yards of you make an Aptitude check or reveal themselves and approach you in their true form. Lasts for as long as your voice lasts. Eidola that succeed their check can ignore the tone until the next time you use this ability.

4. Esoteric Lens
Form a simple loupe in the form of a translucent stone in your clenched fist. If gazed through, reveals eidola and esoteric fields within [dice] yards. Lasts for [dice] turns.

// NEGOTIATION
Roll Disposition Die + Faction Die on below table to determine encountered NPC’s reaction. Disposition Die is how the NPC views the party/leader/interlocutor personally, so stuff like high Appeal or cool clothes help. Faction Die is the party’s credibility with the encountered NPC’s organization or alignment. Both start at d6 and raise or lower based on various factors.

roll	reaction
2	hostile – attack
3-5	unfriendly – attack in 1 round without a good reason
6-8	uninterested – ignore the party without a good reason
9-11	talkative – will help the party for a good reason
12	amused – will help in the party for a decent reason

Human hirelings and contracted eidola are a key component in surviving in the Katabatic Zone. PCs can’t have more allies (whether they are humans or contracted eidola) than 1/3 their Appeal score, rounded down. If an ally is endangered, compromised, or insulted, their employer may be required to make an Appeal check to not lose their loyalty.

from Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse

// DAMAGE AND WOUNDS
Notice how each weapon in the list had two dice? The first is the Damage Die. If an attack lands, roll it and subtract the value from the target’s HP like normal. Easy. Being reduced to 0 HP means you have to make a Physique check or die, and are incapacitated still on a success.

The second is the Location Die which determines where the attack lands. Some weapons are more deadly/lends themselves well to clonking people on the head, and so have a better Location Die.

A location that’s been hit has a minor wound. Until it’s patched up with a turn of effort, any action that requires using that body part has disadvantage.
A location that has an untreated minor wound that gets hit again has a major wound, which means it any action that requires using that body part has disadvantage until you spend time laid up to heal.
Further injury to a location with an unhealed major wound renders it useless. If it’s your head or torso, you’ll also need to make a Physique check to see if you die, and are still incapacitated on a success. If you’re alive when the smoke clears, you may have permanent consequences.

roll	location
1-2	legs
3	Torso
4-5	Arms
6+	Head

Armor is per hit location and reduces all incoming damage by its Armor Score. An attacked reduced to 0 damage does not injure its hit location. A turn’s rest in a safe place restores 1d6 HP, as does resting in a dangerous place and eating a snack.

// MISADVENTURES

Shady Dr. Sepulveda has a standing offer for esoteric substances and artifacts extracted from the Katabatic Zone. The Administration that runs Cuatro Santos certainly frowns/prosecutes such exercises, but she pays pretty well.
Sepulveda’s bitter rival Dr. Jimenez wants eikonometry readings from the Seventh Heaven, a particularly rarefied region of the Katabatic Zone ruled by eidola born from a desire for order. He’s willing to pay quite a bit for your trouble.
Word on the street is that a commando expedition armed with exoskeletal Frames never came back from their mission into the Katabatic Zone. Whatever got them is probably still lurking, but it sure would be sweet to have a mech or two.
Somebody’s been constructing eidolon familiars from dream-stuff and selling them to gangs inside Cuatro Santos as obedient heavy muscle. Old Man Ramiro will pay good money to anyone who can shut down his rival’s suppliers, especially since the Bureau of Affairs has started sniffing around.
The Bureau of Affairs is keeping something really tasty in one of their labs not far from the edge of the city. Nobody knows what it is, but everyone knows it’s valuable. Up for a heist?

January 6, 2017 jacinto clerics, demon, encounters, flowerland, intro, LotFP, magic, monsters, new barbary, Not Dead Yet, npcs, san serafín, witch

the earth does not want you

hey guys. it’s certainly been a while. i’ve been thinking about a weird fantasy florida, recently, out in the palm scrub, where everything is mean and sharp and unfriendly and unnavigable and really kind of beautiful in a careless sort of way.

sinner
her flesh moves like fire on her bones, her hair roils like a plume of smoke from her head, her feet barely touch the water as she strides across it and you smell the black magic in the air: hot metal and raw meat and ozone.

Each sinner knows a random cleric spell with a level equal to their HD. They can cast it at will.
Sinners cannot cross lines of salt or enter holy ground or consecrated buildings like churches, and they must flee the sounds of church bells and calls to prayer as if they had failed a Morale check.
Sinners can walk on water, walls, and ceilings; they are supernaturally light when it suits them, and any surface or structure that can support the weight of a crow will also support a sinner.

corpse
they are pale, luxuriously dressed in black veils and black lace, they move in groups of two or three, they dart about close to the ground in the edges of your vision. they never seem to be what they should, seeming to be very large and very far away, or else very small and very close; you always have to reach farther than you think to strike them with your weapon, but they can just raise their hand and touch you all the same.

Each corpse can cast a random magic-user spell with a level equal to their HD. They can cast it at will.
If a corpse sees an open grave (dug for the purposes of burying someone, at least 6 feet deep, a burial marker at the head of the grave), it must climb inside and lie down. If it hears properly recited funeral rites (INT check and a round of effort), it must make a Morale check. Corpses cannot cross lines of salt.
As long as nobody can see its point of departure or arrival, a corpse can teleport to any location in 120′.

palm devil
a figure standing at the edge of the pines, a little too tall to be human, the contours of its body beneath its ragged coat too long and slender, it’s holding a palmetto frond in front of its face, and when it turns to you, all the leaves on all the trees as far as you can see rattle, malicious and filled with volition

a palm devil’s face is indescribable; should anyone see it they must Save vs Magic or become Feebleminded. They will transform into a sinner by midnight of the following Sunday unless restored by Remove Curse.
Can cast Gust of Wind, Move Earth, and Plant Growth twice each per fight.
Can fly by riding its palm frond.
In a palm devil’s hands, a palm frond functions as a vorpal axe and can easily cut through any mundane substance.

venomous augury
someone has nailed a huge rattlesnake to the trunk of a dead pine tree at regular intervals, tied lengths of red silk to each nail head. it looks at you with wet human eyes and tells you something horrible.

the venomous augury knows everything, probably. A player can ask it anything and it will give them the true answer. This can amount to a wish–ask it where the elixir of eternal life it, and it will tell you, whether or not there was an elixir before you asked. However, every answer introduces an evil equal in influence or power to the wealth or knowledge being sought. Ask “where is the woman who will save the world?” and the augury is liable to answer “in the house of the man who will one day destroy it”
once someone has asked the augury a question, it forevermore appears to them as a stinking dead rattlesnake grotesquely nailed to a tree.

prophet of mud
a huge hairless face emerges from the muck in front of you. it does not bother to turn its head, but swivels its bulging yellow eyes towards you as it begins to hum a hymn

the prophet of mud is a third level cleric and knows Bless, Command, and Augury and can cast spells from its head or its hands.
the prophet can emerge from any body of mud. it can reach its hands up from any body of mud or murky water that is contiguous with the mud it head is in.
the prophet’s head and two hands get their own turn in the initiative order. it can only see what its head sees, naturally, but will feel things out with one hand to help the other.
the prophet can spend a round singing hymns to cast Rock To Mud at will.

mother
there is a mother deep beneath the earth, she once had a shell of many hard plates and swam with many sharp legs and saw with a constellation of many watchful eyes. she died long ago, when this land was still a sea, but she is still here, she is a hollow in the bedrock far below, a long spiral in the dark. sometimes she tells the land what it used to be, and when she does it listens.

photos by me

June 18, 2016 jacinto encounters, idyll, intro, is this gonna work, items, monsters, npcs, table

playing cute

My players tend to be murderhobo-y because that is the game they want to play and that is the game I run for them. However, I’ve been thinking about what it would be like to run a game that is still about digging around in strange places underground, still about fighting monsters and taking their stuff, still about most of the things that makes Dungeons and Dragons what it is, but is centered more around community and building stuff. I’ve been chewing this over since I read Ryuutama, which has a lovely aesthetic and a lot of good ideas, but isn’t something I’d probably want to play. Scrap Princess’s G+ post here had me digging up my old notes and thought on the matter.

Anyway, here are a handful of systems you can graft onto most editions of Dungeons and Dragons to make it a little more Miyazaki and a little less Leiber.

~MAKING FRIENDS~

from riviera: the promised land

Families
All characters get a family name, and 6-7 family names make up the majority of the random table. If a PC shares a family name with an NPC and can explain how they’re related (Oh, your mom is Anabel? She’s my aunt’s favorite cousin), they get a +1 or +2 bonus to their Reaction Roll.

Monsters
Each monster gets a table of Sentiments, things that trigger Morale checks and make them want to talk instead of fight. Each Morale check requires a novel appeal to a monster’s Sentiment–if your display of bravery didn’t win the dragon’s respect, you have to prove your bravery in some other way. Monsters of the same time within an encounter/lair share the same Sentiment, though appeals to a group’s Sentiment is mitigated or temporary unless you successfully appeal to the group’s leader.

Goblins

Their parents have gone missing, and they’re afraid and angry. They make a Morale check when confronted with kindness and authority.
They don’t have any food and they’re half-starved. They make a Morale check when given a gift of food.
Humans desecrated the Goblin Shrine. Make a Morale check when greeted with a sincere apology and display of respect.
Something has been disturbing their sleep. Whispered condolences and a promise to look into the problem trigger a Morale check.
They have a new leader who has driven them to the life of the marauding monster. They make a Morale check when sternly admonished or told to stand up for themselves.
They have been cursed into a frenzy. Make a Morale check when blessed with a prayer to return them to their senses.

from etrian odyssey

~EXPERIENCE~
You gain XP for spending you gold or using goods you retrieve, loot, or steal on your adventures.

For every gold piece you invest in your village, you gain 1 experience point. Constructing new buildings, improving existing ones, paying villagers to plow fields all count. You only need to invest value, not actual gold coins; if you retrieve 500 gp worth of lumber on a logging expedition and use it to build a house, you gain 500 XP even though coins never changed hands.
For every gold piece you spend on behalf of villagers, you gain 1 experience point. Buying medicine, purchasing gifts, hiring tutors, going on dates, throwing parties and festivals all count. Again, you get XP for value, whether it is in gold coins or goods; hiring a doctor for Auntie provides XP, but if you steal 500 gp worth of feast supplies from the Bandit King and throw a party, you get XP, too. (Credit to +Alex Chalk for this idea)

Buildings
It costs 1,000 gp to upgrade a building for the first time, and doubles every time thereafter.

General Store

Only sells rural area items on the Miscellaneous equipment list from the LotPF handbook. 1 in 6 chance of a given item being in stock, and only 1d4 will be available. Their stock changes every week, since the caravan arrives each Monday and villagers buy and sell goods there. You can put in a special order for 1 item each week and they’ll have it in by the next, but it costs double.
Each upgrades improves the chances of stocking a particular item by 1 in 6.

The Inn

Staying at the Inn during downtime lets the party reroll their maximum HP.
Each upgrade allows a player to reroll one of their character’s hit dice.

The Tavern

A night of drinking at the Tavern allows players to attract 1d6-4 potential hirelings. Use the LotFP process to determine interest and loyalty.
Each upgrade gives a +1 bonus to the number of potential hirelings.

The Farms

As the village prospers more and more, villagers can give more more stuff without needing payment. For each upgrade to the Farms, you can get an additional free use of a service or facility.

Blacksmith

The blacksmith only makes weapons and armor on request, and each piece takes a week. Initially, the blacksmith can only forge weapons that deal d6 damage or less and make armor with 14 AC or fewer.
Each upgrade allows the blacksmith to forge weapons that deal 1 die step more and make armor with an additional point of AC.

Witch’s Cottage

The witch has a 1 in 6 chance of curing a disease, poison, or curse per week of care. Some particularly dangerous poisons, diseases, or curses will also require rare or expensive ingredients.
Each upgrade improves the witch’s chance of successully curing a poison or disease or lifting a curse by 1 in 6.

The Wandering Devil Merchant

The Devil Merchant has a 1 in 6 chance of being in town each week. He has a 1 in 6 chance of having a scroll of a given magic-user spell, with a penalty equal to the spell’s level. his stock changes out every time he visits town.
Each upgrade improves the Devil Merchant’s chance of being in town and having a given scroll by 1 in 6.

from final fantasy tactics a2

~DOWNTIME~
There is a 1 in 6 chance that a Downtime Events will occur each week. Should probably be d100, but this is just proof of concept. Based off of the Hazard System.

Downtime Events

A random villager becomes very ill, beyond even the curatives of the town witch. Their cure requires an herb found only the peak of a nearby and monster-infested mountain.
The River God has become restless, and the stream that runs through town has been flooding worse and worse. Venture to his shrine in the nearby Caverns to find out what troubles him.
The Lunar Festival approaches and bandits attacked the caravan that was bringing goods for the sacramental feast. Retrieve the ingredients before those slobs eat them all and anger the Moon Goddess.
Harvest is almost here and the goblins know it. See if you can prevent them from attacking so that the village can get its crops harvested and safely stored.
A random villager has gone missing, with evidence that they were taken by the local gang of werewolves. Save them!
The local bandit gang has sent a messenger, hat in hand. Quite a few of them are frighteningly sick, and they wonder if you’d be willing to send help?

June 1, 2016 jacinto amateur hour, Carcosa, intro, magic, modern, nephilim, Pop Tartary, pseudomonarchia

yer a wizard, henry

Henry Flagler was most famously a Florida industrialist, but he had other, more esoteric interests, pursued in ritual garb on the manicured lawns of his estate or chased down in a naked frenzy among the swamp and cypress. Henry Flagler was a dedicated occultist, and used a considerable portion of his wealth to establish Black Cypress College, a private institution with a mission to plumb the breadth and depth of the magical sciences.

actually Flagler College

You are a magician, possessed of a wonderful and secret power. As such, you have been accepted to Black Cypress College to further your craft and the advancement of magical knowledge. What you find there might be corrupt, venal, sclerotic, and frequently disturbing, but right now, it’s all you have.

Character Creation

Factors and Factions

Virgo Invictus
Something like the John Birch Society by way of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, a far right secret society dedicated to the propagation, destruction, imprisonment, resurrection, or study (possible all of the above) of an ancient spiritual entity known as Virgo, Victor, or sometimes just V.

The Grecians
A mystic order of alcoholics who hold bacchanals in the cypress swamps. They claim to learn magical secrets during the ecstasies from Dionysus Krocodilia, an etymologically suspect and distinctly Floridian aspect of the Greek deity himself. Several Grecians have gone missing lately, perhaps drowned in the swamp, perhaps devoured by their fellows in a fit, perhaps feuding with the local Santeria community.

The Deans
The quasi-immortal administrators of the College. Nearly a century of access to the generous (and free) faculty dining hall has rendered them immensely fat, alcoholic, hematomatic, wracked with gout, yellowed with jaundice, and nearly identical in their grotesqueness. There are thirteen of them, each ruder than the last, and they hate each other more with every passing year. Rumor has it they have hatched a scheme to restore their youthful vigor

The ██████
Everyone knows that the College has a ██████, which is odd since nobody can bring themselves to talk about him. Or her. Or it, really, since the ██████ gone unseen since the founding of the school, and the door to their office is always and unpickably locked. Students and faculty have looked into the College’s reclusive ██████ over the years, and it has always ended in tears, murder, or mysterious disappearances resolved by sudden showers of gore during Commencement.

Golconda, by Renee Magritte

March 19, 2016 jacinto fairy, intro, is this gonna work, magic, occult, Pernicious Albion, spell, type v

MAGICIANS: THE MAGICKING: THE RPG

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is a very good novel that you should read. I have been wanting to run a game based on it (Austen pastiche in moody Napoleonic-era Britain; wicked fairies, whimsical magicians, intrigue, kidnapping, murder) for quite some time; my setting Pernicious Albion is me turning it into a D&D game. I have been wanting to run something more true to form, but it’s a bit tough. Magicians operate in quite a different scale than most people; one of my favorite parts of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is a footnote where the author tells us Spain considered demanding reparations for one of the main characters after he rearranged a fair chunk of its geography.

Ars Magica and Fate are obvious solutions, but I’m not too hot on actually running them. This is a bullshit hack, but its starts to get at the feel I’m going for.

Character Creation
Make a 5th edition character. Pick human as the race, and do not pick a class. You are all Magicians.

Magicians start with 10d6 Magic dice. This represents the strength of their sorcery. They can temporarily lose Magic dice through exertion, but they can never have more than their maximum.

Magicians do not have a set list of spells. Each time they cast one, they determine what it does by assigning dice to its Duration, Range, Area Of Effect, and Intensity. Each category must have at least one dice, and can have up to 5. The total number of dice assigned to a spell cannot exceed a magician’s current Magic dice.

Once a magician has determined a spell’s effects, they roll all of the assigned dice.

When a dice comes up 6, the magician removes it from their pool of Magic dice until they take a long rest.
If a number of dice greater than a magician’s level come up 1, the spell is a botch. Something happens, and it is related to the spell’s effect, but only incidental to what the magician wanted to happen.

Casting a spell does not expend Magic dice unless they come up a 6. Unless the spell is a botch, the spell always works, even if the magician loses or runs out of dice.

The following charts state how many dice a magician must assign to a given category in order to achieve a given effect. All spells use the same Duration, Range, and Area Of Effect Tables, but no two spells use the same Intensity table.

Most of the tables are self explanatory. Area Of Effect details the size of the area effected around the actual spell. Intensity (each Intensity table is listed with each spell) details the greatest creature, object, or concept that can be affected by the spell. If a magician has an Area Of Effect that encompasses an entire city but an Intensity of “a torchfire” when casting the spell It Burns, they could put out every candle in town. If Intensity ever seems to encroach on Area of Effect, just use whichever the magician has placed more dice in.

DURATION

1d6 A moment
2d6 A day
3d6 A week
4d6 A month
5d6 A year and a day

RANGE

1d6 an arm’s span
2d6 a stone’s throw
3d6 shouting distance
4d6 within sight
5d6 out beyond the horizon

AREA OF EFFECT.

1d6 all within an arm’s span
2d6 all within the range of a thrown stone
3d6 all within shouting distance
4d6 all within sight
5d6 all to out beyond the horizon

Spells
There are, of course, far more spells than this. Magicians start with 3.

Utterance of Black Feathers
Allows a magician to perform feats of manipulation, transformation, summoning, and destruction pertaining to crows.
INTENSITY

1d6 one crow
2d6 thirteen crows
3d6 a murder of crows
4d6 crows to cover a field
5d6 crows to blacken the sky

Breath of the Holy Earth
Allows a magician to call forth, direct, and banish wind. (+Alex Chalk gets credit for this one)
INTENSITY

1d6 a draft
2d6 a breeze
3d6 a gust
4d6 a gale
5d6 a whirlwind

It Burns
Allows a magician to enkindle, throw, extinguish, shape, and otherwise manipulate flame.
INTENSITY

1d6 a torchfire
2d6 a campfire
3d6 a bonfire
4d6 a funeral pyre
5d6 a housefire

Fingers of Night
Allows a magician to create, shape, and banish darkness

INTENSITY

1d6 a shadow like that of a passing cloud
2d6 the gloom of a thick forest
3d6 night, just as the last of the sun is leaving the sky
4d6 a moonless night
5d6 a darkness heavy enough to be felt

Greatest Folly
Allows a magician to ignite, strengthen, diminish, and twist feelings of affection.

INTENSITY

1d6 Delight
2d6 Friendship
3d6 Infatuation
4d6 Craven Obsession
5d6 Love

Really should put up a setting sketch, but I’m tired and don’t feel very good so eh. Tomorrow maybe. Here’s some pictures of magicians.

the Lackaday Twins (not actual title, by John Singer Sargent)

John Pharoah, Ursurper to the Northern Throne (not actual title, from El Shaddai)

Lord Umberlin of the Bells (not actual title, from etrian odyssey)

Claude the Gaul, wanted in 10 counties for violating the course of history (from Persona 5, not actual title)

February 27, 2016 jacinto intro, items, LotFP, original dungeons and dragons, san serafín

you’ve met with a terrible fate

You were all on a ship headed to the continent of El Sur. You didn’t make it there.

Instead, you have woken up on a strange beach of black sand and dark water, the sun too large and too red on the western horizon. You have nothing but the salt-crusted clothes on your back, and the following items that washed up with you. You can take as much or as little as you want, but you can only take what you can carry and you have to share with everybody else. Assume you have as many bags, packs, and pouches as you need to haul this stuff around.

We are using this encumbrance system. You do not know the next opportunity you will have resupply.

Weapons

The sword: d8 damage, +1 damage if wielded with 2 hands
The spear: d6 damage, 2 handed, a reach weapon
The bow: d6 damage, 120′ range, two handed, comes with 18 arrows
The sling: d4 damage, 60′ range, one handed, you can always find ammunition
The stave: d4 damage, lets you cast a random 5e cantrip (nothing that sheds light, all damage dice are reduced by 1 step) one every 10 minutes (1 Turn)
The daggers: d4 damage, can make two attacks if you’re wielding both
The axe: 1d10 damage, two handed
The bomb: 40′ range, everything within 20′ takes 4d6 damage when it goes off

Armor

The yellow baldric: +1 AC, +1 to saves vs poison
The patched hide: +1 AC
The rusted chain: +2 AC, encumbers
The piecemeal plate: +3 AC, encumbers moderately
The shield: +1 AC, requires a free hand
The black, fur-trimmed robe: +2 to saving throws versus magic
The blue silk robe: +1 to all saving throws
The red vestments: +3 AC vs Chaotic creatures

Equipment

Book: The Seraphic Atlas (+1 to Metaphysics checks)
Book: A Child’s Guide to the Wild (+1 to Nature checks)
Book: A Catalogue of Human Failure (+1 to History checks)
A holy rite (Turn Chaos as a 2nd level cleric 1/day)
lockpicks (required to make Pick Locks)
pot of ointment (heal 1d4 HP. Has 1d10 doses)
100′ of rope
grappling hook and 25′ of rope
Doctor’s bag (required to make Medicine checks)
Poisoner’s pack (required to make Poison-making checks)
Disguise kit (required to make Disguise checks)
10 hard biscuits
10 full waterskins
a lantern
6 flasks of oil
6 torches
ghost food (can be used as a medium offering to any god)
a 1 pound block of lard
a flute
a dozen metal spikes
A lighter
A pack of cigarettes
a bottle of rum
a flare gun
a pouch with 6 strange coins
A beautiful ruby ring
A cloth doll

January 9, 2015 jacinto classes, clerics, intro, never read balzac, new age dnd

the weather in Goriat is lovely this time of year

Almost finished with the first chunk of Albion, but I have been less and less happy with and more and more stressed about it lately, which means it is time to think about other things for a while.

You are on the remote Isle of Goriat. Centuries ago, the island’s technologically advanced ancient inhabitants tried to capture Goriat’s tutelary wind deity for long-forgotten but assuredly unsavory purposes. This killed off most of them, and the god’s been missing ever since. Goriat is now cut off from the rest of the world, because without the god there are neither wind nor currents for hundreds of miles around the island.

You are in Hame, the last surviving settlement on Goriat, located where the River Wry flows into the sea. Most of Hame’s several hundred residents survive on subsistence farming and fishing, but you’re different. You scavenge for treasure in the ruins your ancestors built.

CHARACTER CREATION
Attribute scores work like LotFP:

from lamentations of the flame princess

Attribute/Skill checks
Roll a d20 under Relevant Attribute+Relevant Skill. Always fail on a 20. You get a +1 to your class skills every odd level, including level 1.

List of skills:
Athletics
Charm
Dowse
Lore
Mechanics
Medicine
Perception
Profession (pick a specialty, like singing or smithing or masonry)
Nature
Scare
Sleight of Hand
Stealth

JOBS

You have HD equal to your level. Reroll them every time you rest. Add your Constitution modifier to the total.
There are no saving throws, only ability checks. Skills can help you out in certain save-like situations (Lore to resist magic, Nature to resist disease, etc)
Experience is based on DCCRPG. It takes 10 * level additional XP to reach the next level. Fights, heists, delves, and so on net you 1-4 XP each.

from Bravely Default

Warrior
Class skills: Athletics + 1 more of your choice
Equipment: You can use any weapon or armor.
Every odd level, you get +1 to attack rolls. Every even level you get +1 to damage rolls.
Choose a specialty:
Virtue: You know one random boon as an ascetic
Anger: You can rage (deal double damage, take half damage, advantage on Strength checks) for one fight per day.
Simplicity: You deal d6+1 damage with your unarmed attacks. Your base AC when not wearing Armor is 14.

Beast Child

from persona

Class skills: Nature + 1 more of your choice
Equipment: You cannot use metal weapons and are untrained in the use of armor.
Beast Children can turn into animals. In order to be able to turn into an animal, a Beast Child must possess a trophy, acquired by defeating the creature in a fight, such as a scale, fang, or piece of hide. The animal can be of any level, and trophies always count as significant items for purposes of encumbrance. When a Beast Child changes shape, only their trophies change with them. All other equipment falls to the ground.

You can either start as an animal with a human trophy or an animal with a human trophy. Pick from dog, crow, spider, or monkey.

from suikoden

Shaman

Class skills: Lore + 1 more of you choice
Equipment: You can use simple weapons and are untrained in the use of armor.
Go here. If I don’t get around to fixing it, summoning a spirit takes a number of Rounds equal to its HD, not hours.

from Disgaea

Specialist
Class skills: See below
Equipment: You can use simple and martial weapons and are trained in the use of light armor.
You start with 4 skill points, to distribute among any skills you wish. You gain 2 more skill points every time you gain a level.

Ascetic/Monk/Nun

from tactics ogre: wheel of fortune

Class skills: Dowse + 1 more of your choice
Equipment: You can use simple weapons and are not trained in the use of armor.
You start with 2 random boons from the longer list. You can learn more by reading sutras, liturgies, and exegeses, or training under an abbot. To cast a boon, you must chant the associated prayer, mantra, or passage of scripture. For each Round of chanting, there is a 1 in 6 chance the boon will take effect.

EQUIPMENT
You start with 1 weapon d8+Cha mod things. You can carry a number of significant items equal to your Strength score. You are assumed to have the bags necessary to haul this stuff around.

Weapons
Ranged weapons automatically come with 12 pieces of ammunition.

Simple weapons deal d6-1 damage. They are usually improvised tools, such as staves, pitchforks, wrenches, or baseball bats.
Martial weapons deal d6 damage. They are designed to kill, and include short swords, axes, pikes, bows, and most firearms
Expert weapons deal d6+1 damage. They require special training or two hands, and include fancy swords, crossbows, battleaxes, and stuff like sniper rifles or flamethrowers.

Armor

Light armor gives you AC 14+Dex mod AC
Heavy armor gives you AC 16 AC
Shields give you +1 AC

Gear

Two-way radio
Solar-powered lamp (recharges with 1/hour of sunlight, but lasts as long as 1 torch)
4 torches
Bag of ball bearings
Toolkit
Portable computer
1 stick of dynamite
map of the island
1 week’s worth of rations
a mule
50′ of rope
bottle of propitiatory wine
sack of golden lotus powder
first aid kit
Ritual kit (useful for summoners)
Holy symbol (useful for monks)
Grappling hook
12 pieces of extra ammunition
Compass
3d6 dollars.

GORIAT 20 QUESTIONS

What is the deal with my cleric’s religion?

Ascetics draw on the celestial power of Heaven through prayers, chants, and mantras. The particular divinity is up to you, but the deities of heaven usually pertain to the sun, sky, and stars.
Shamans draw their power from the capricious spirit allies, whose natures and abilities are innumerable. People tend to be super suspicious of shamans though–they don’t like spirits being brought into town.

Where can we go to buy standard equipment?

The Hamely Bazaar! I abstractify (???) equipment purchasing, unless you’re buying something interesting.

Where can we go to get platemail custom fitted for this monster I just befriended?

The people of Hame have little tolerance for those who traffic with the creatures of the wild, but Blacksmith Artesse might be able to hammer something together if you do him a favor on the side.

Who is the mightiest wizard in the land?

There are no wizards left of Goriat, though the rogue shaman Gnomon and his mortal enemy Sister Naomi have the greatest supernatural power.

Who is the greatest warrior in the land?

Sir Belvedere (not a knight in any legal sense) is Hame’s monster-hunter du jour. Well equipped, in the possession of many followers, and possessing a keen eye for licensing, Belvedere is universally considered an absolute dick by the adventuring crowd.

Who is the richest person in the land?

Money only does so much on Goriat, but the Argus family has the most of it. There farms and livestock are almost suspiciously fecund.

Where can we go to get some magical healing?

The ascetics of the Abbey or the shamans of the Empty Shrine, both a day’s travel from town, are your best bet.

Where can we go to get cures for the following conditions: poison, disease, curse, level drain, lycanthropy, polymorph, alignment change, death, undeath?

See above

Is there a magic guild my MU belongs to or that I can join in order to get more spells?

Monks and nuns can acquire the mantras for new boons at the Abbey, while shamans can acquire new summoning rites at the Empty Shrine. Both would require pretty significant favors.

Where can I find an alchemist, sage or other expert NPC?

The engineers and hackers Hame tend to hang out at Artesse’s garage.

Where can I hire mercenaries?

Just post a bulletin in Hame. Don’t expect anyone on top of their game, though.

Is there any place on the map where swords are illegal, magic is outlawed or any other notable hassles from Johnny Law?

Even the town is subject to incursions from animals, spirits, and rogue golems, so carrying weapons is accepted and expected. Magic is tolerated, but openly summoning or commanding spirits in Hame is a bad idea.

Which way to the nearest tavern?

The Fountain of Dust is Hame’s preeminent watering hole and inn. There are nicer digs out there, but they’ll cost you more.

What monsters are terrorizing the countryside sufficiently that if I kill them I will become famous?

The Ocularium, a rogue clay golem
Bathsheba, a freakishly large cougar with a commensurate appetite.

Are there any wars brewing I could go fight?

Not really. There’s a bandit encampment parked on a desert spring to the northwest, though.

How about gladiatorial arenas complete with hard-won glory and fabulous cash prizes?

The Iron Ring in Hame holds a year-long tournament with weekly fights.

Are there any secret societies with sinister agendas I could join and/or fight?

Mmmmmmaybe

What is there to eat around here?

Vegetables! Chicken and fish if you can pay!

Any legendary lost treasures I could be looking for?

Anyone who can find Goriat’s lost wind god has a ticket off the island.
The legendary gun Ultima Ratio
The Night God’s Bow

Where is the nearest dragon or other monster with Type H treasure?

Far to the north is a tower that juts from the earth like a nail from flesh. It is terribly tall and terribly dark and only terrible things live inside.

December 14, 2014 jacinto classifieds, intro, Pernicious Albion

A Perfidious Primer

Queen’s Crossing is a mercantile town perched atop the greatest bridge spanning Albion’s River Dour. It teems with social climbing merchants (much to the revulsion of House Herpetu, Queen’s Crossing’s resident Old Money and the object of an endless parade of nouveau riche marriage proposals) and an equal number of cultists, who traffic with the wayward Spawn of Agorath that dream on the riverbed below.

You each have a room at the Hateford Home, a boarding house of middling reputation and adequate sanitation located in one of the rougher neighborhoods of Queen’s Crossing. It is run by Madam Eugenia, a truculent widow locally famous for the diameter of her forearms and talent with a hatchet. She often rents rooms to freelancers, vagabonds, and soldiers-of-fortune, and so hopeful clients often leave job postings, which as of yesterday are as follows:

From High House Herpetou
A sum of £1,500 for any who apprehend the despicable person or persons responsible for circulating threats against that most majestic and virtuous of fairies, the Lord of No-pity, who has graced our Lady Herpetu with a visit. Contact Dame Balustrade at Castle Herpetu for details.

His Grace, the Lord of No-pity

From the Royal Society
A team of scholars has disappeared on an expedition to Osric’s Tor. £1,500 for returning them alive; £750 for returning their remains. We will also pay for any antiquities safely recovered from the site. Speak Professor Lately at the Queen’s College for the particulars.

Osric’s Tor
by Martin Bodman

From the Postmaster
Three of our couriers have failed to return from the village of Scavenger’s Weir. While it is admittedly a wretched little town, the sentimental bleating of those with relatives there has begun to wear on me, and these disappearances are interfering with my office’s function. £1,500 for resolving the situation.

September 12, 2014 jacinto intro, spell, table

Odd Hack Character Creation

Rules as written in Delving Deeper, except as follows:

HIT POINTS: BLOOD AND GUTS
Use rationalized hit dice progression. Also, characters have two different pools of HP.

All characters start out with just Blood. If a character has a Constitution score of 14+, they gain an additional point of Blood every level. If their score is 18, they gain 2 points every level.
Once a character reaches 6 points of Blood, their HD rolls for maximum HP go towards Guts.

Characters usually take damage to Guts first. If they are reduced to less than 0 Blood, they die. Blood heals at a rate of 1 point per day of rest. Guts heals at a rate of d6 points per 10 minutes of rest. Critical hits and sneak attacks deal damage to Blood, and monsters have Blood and Guts for HP as well. Largely based on this.

RACES
You can only start as a human, chosen from one of the following tribes. You can gain access to new tribes and species if you form a neutral or better relationship with one of their settlements or towns.

Goth: you have a +2 bonus to your Magic saving throw
Norge: you are untroubled by natural cold and take half damage from magical cold
Saracen: You know an extra language and can pick from the expanded language list, regardless of your Intelligence score.
Tatar: you have a 3 in 6 chance of being able to repair or sabotage machinery, robots, or golems. If you are a Thief, your chances of success increase with your other skills.

LANGUAGES
If your Intelligence is 10-, you speak two of the following. If it is 12-, you speak 3. If it is 14+, you speak 4.

Gothic
Norsk
Saraceni
Tatar

Anyone with 15+ Intelligence can pick from the following list as well:

Elegaic, the language of the undead
Twill, the language of elves and birds
Numen, the language of gods and spirits
Cipher, the language of golems and robots

ENCUMBRANCE
We are using this system, but you can carry an extra container if your Strength is 14+ and two extra containers if your Strength is 18.

CLERICS

Clerics must choose a religion. Clerics can learn a number of Cleric miracles equal to their level. They can cast each miracle as much as they want, but when they do so, they must make a reaction roll (roll 2d6) to determine if the Heavenly/Nether forces upon which they are calling approve of their intervention. Low rolls might require favors or sacrifices. To learn a miracle, a Cleric must memorize a particular sutra, scripture, sermon, or liturgy, which they recite upon casting. Clerics start with one random miracle; if they roll a reversible miracle, they must pick one. Lawful Clerics still Turn Undead, while Chaotic Clerics Command Undead.

Liturgy of Kingly Protection/The House of Four Demons: lets you cast Protection From Evil/Good
Heaven’s Feast Sutra/The Famine Gift Sutra: lets you cast Purify/Putrefy Food and Drink
The First Words/The Litany of Night: lets you cast Light/Darkness
Rite of the Scales of Justice: lets you cast Detect Magic at will
The Parable of the Shore/The Way of All Flesh: lets you cast Cure/Cause Light Wounds
The Miracle of Tongues: lets you cast Speak with Beasts

FIGHTERS
Fighters work as written in Delving Deeper.

MAGIC USERS
Magicians can learn any number of Magic-user spells. They can cast each of them once, and can regain expended spells by getting a full night’s sleep. All spells require a particular object to cast; more powerful spells require rarer and more cumbersome components. Magicians start with 2 random spells and their components. When you learn a spell, such as from a scroll or a book, you find out what it requires as a component.

A cloth doll: lets you cast Animate Golem, which functions the same as Invoke Elemental, except that the golem has HD equal to your level.
A sack of crow feathers: Let you cast Fly. Insinuate themselves into your flesh while you are under the effects of the spell.
A human rib, sharpened at one end: lets you cast Magic Missile.
A silver bell, inscribed with a closed eye: lets you cast Sleep.
A stained disc of bronze: lets you cast Darkness, the reversed version of Light.
A book bound in red thread: lets you cast Charm Person.
A giant spider carapace: lets you cast Web.
A large ivory earhorn: lets you cast Sixth Sense.
A cloak of human hair: lets you cast Invisibility.
A giant horse skull, wired through with gold: lets you cast Fear
A mummified fish with pearls for eyes: kissing the fish lets you cast Water Breathing
A tin breastplate inscribed with a pentacle: lets you cast Shield
A long-stemmed ebony pipe: lets you cast Phantasm
A great brass horn: lets you cast Dispel Magic
A flute carved from a human thighbone: lets you cast Hold Person
A snake tattoo on the side of forefinger and thumb: lets you cast Read Magic at will
A tattoo of an open eye on your palm: lets you cast Detect Magic at will
An arm-sized iron nail: lets you cast Witch Lock
A giant silver skeleton key: Lets you cast Knock
An dead sapling studded with lead spikes: lets you cast Plant Growth

THIEVES
Thieves can use any magic item or piece of equipment. They have a 3 in 6 chance of succeeding at the following. Their chances increase by to 4 in 6 at level 3 and 5 in 6 at level 6. At level 9, they roll twice and take the higher result whenever they make a skill check.

Climb
Disarm Traps
Hide
Listen
Pick Lock
Search
Sleight of Hand

NEW CLASSES AND MULTICLASSINGYou can gain access to new classes by coming across them in your adventures. By default gain levels in other classes, but in the course of the game, you can find ways to bypass this–werewolves, for example, split their experience between their current class and their Fighter-equivalent wolf shape.

September 11, 2014 jacinto adventures, intro, is this gonna work, spell

God of the Earth

Need to rewrite my Albion favor tables and I’m dreading it. Messing around with Delving Deeper, a Original Dungeons and Dragons clone instead.

OK, so:

Type V has all these interesting(ish?) material components and then immediately handwaves most of it away with arcane focuses and what have you (though I like the idea of, say, an imprisoned wizard with a confiscated wand grubbing around for bat shit so they can break out of jail with some righteous Fireballs).
I go back and forth on spell slots and spell preparation. I don’t actually don’t mind them, but explaining them to players leaves me cold.
Are you reading Kill Six Billion Demons? You should be reading Kill Six Billion Demons. Take a look at (link leads to medium-grade spoilers) this. The six-armed blue demon lady who is so clearly a magic-user is just loaded with stuff. A doll, a book on a chain, a mask-face, glasses, a weird popcorn bottle necklace, a pair of yellow sunglasses, a humungous bag of just stuff, plus whatever she has secreted about her person. I like that.
I love this encumbrance system
I feel exactly, perfectly neutral about wizards wearing armor, but explaining equipment restrictions is work, so I ignore them.

This all converges on wizards. So how about magic-users have no limit on the number or level of spells they can know. They can cast each spell they know once, and must rest before they can recover usage of a cast spell. Each spell requires a material component, which is not consumed in the casting. A spell’s power correlates with how burdensome and rare a component is; Magic Missile only requires a want capped with flint, while Time Stop requires a three-foot tall lead hourglass inlaid with gold. All components take up a minimum of 1 encumbrance slot. So a magic-user can wear armor, but it cuts into the number of components they can haul around. Plus they are ladened with occult accruements.

EXAMPLES

Animal Growth: a head-sized mass of crystallized pituitary fluid, harvested from a cursed beast, such as a werewolf or dire animal.
Animate Dead: a complete human skeleton. Does not have to be in one piece; some necromancers grind it to dust and keep it in a sack, while others strap the bones to their body.
Charm Person: a book with fine vellum pages, bound with red silk thread. Casting the spell requires writing the name of the target (or a description of them) in the book.
Comprehend Languages: a pair of glasses tinted blue with cobalt; the caster must look through them for the spell to work
Darkness: a black velvet hood. The magic-user momentarily pulls it over their own eyes to cast the spell.
Knock: a silver skeleton key, roughly the size and weight of a longsword
Fireball: a fire giant’s ulna (roughly the size of a quarterstaff)
Fly: a sack of crow feathers (about 100 birds’ worth) that insinuate themselves into the flesh of the caster when they are under the effect of the spell
invisibility: a cloak woven from human hair; the caster must be wearing it for the spell to work
Magic Missile: an oak wand capped with flint; the caster must point the wand at their target
Light: a fist-sized silver sigil depicting an eye; the caster must turn its gaze towards the target
Shield: a small actual shield of hammered tin depicting a pentacle
Slaying Spell: an iron bell, at least three feet tall, inscribed with open eyes and forged in a graveyard. The caster must ring it for the spell to work.
Sleep: a long-handled silver bell, about the size of a dagger. It must be rung for the spell to work.
Water Breathing: a whole fish, often mummified or suspended in formaldehyde to prevent it from rotting into uselessness
Web: a giant spider (at least the size of a terrier), usually dead for the sake of convenience.

Anywhere, here’s the skeleton of a open-air-dungeon-unless-it’s-a-point-crawl I’ll be maybe running this maybe filed down version of OD&D in.

The town of Braquefort sits at the foot of a mountain (its name is taboo). A decade ago, the Ecclesium’s holy knights succeeded in exorcising (i.e. killing) Cybele, the goddess who lived on its peak, and extirpating her cult from the town itself. However, starting a year ago, a beast has begun coming down from the mountain, seizing livestock and ripping apart anyone who stands in its way. This has been accompanied by a sudden increase in fertility–the farms are yielding an unnaturally large harvest, the surviving livestock grow to prodigious size, and the mountain itself teems with dangerous life. The Ecclesium believes that some of the Braquefort villagers have begun making sacrifices to the creature, and are willing to pay the party generously if they bring back its head.

THE MOUNTAIN
SMELLS

overripe fruit
rotting plants
rotting meat
animal musk

SIGHTS

haze of flies
swarms of bloated rabbits scrambling over the corpses of their fellows
tumorous fruit hanging heavy on the branch
handprints in solid stone, haloed with fractures

ENCOUNTERS
ENCOUNTER TABLE

1-2. Wolf (1d6)

3-4. Cougar (1d6)

5-6. Serpent (1d6)

7-8. Die-off

9. Artesse, last shaman of the mountain

10. Sacrifice-bearers (2d6)

11. Vigilant Benbraches

12. God of the Earth

THE GOD OF THE EARTH

Statistics as Hill Giant. Cannot surprise enemies.
He stands as tall as two men, filthy, naked, covered in matted hair, and when you first see him, he will be doing something appalling like grinding the hind legs off of a screaming goat with his blocky white teeth or gouging obscene pictures into stone with his fingertips. He smells, and smells bad, and it is awful and awesome in the old religious sense, a profound glandular stench that puts animals in heat and stirs plants into frantic growth.
The God of the Earth is the orphaned son of Cybele. He is a divine feral child and cannot speak, though he instinctively understands Numen, the language of gods and spirits. The presence of his dead mother’s corpse-tree on the mountain drives him to rage and despair, though he can be appeased for a time with a meal of livestock. He will attack and consume anyone without such propitiations. His heart is a god-seed, and will sprout into a new divinity if planted and tended.

THE EARTH’S TEEMING CHILDREN
Statistics as dire wolf, cave bear, or giant snake. Can eat their HD in corpses before they choke to death.
The predators of the mountain have grown enormous and corpulent, maddened by the buzzing of insects and the reek of dead flesh and the God’s musk. They attack in numbers, and will devour defeated prey until it kills them.
When passing by a die-off, make a DC 12 Constitution save or acquire the Poisoned condition. Those afflicted can make another save at the end of every long rest to recover.
Under the God’s influence, the lesser beasts of the mountain live and die like mayflies, generations of rats and rock hares passing over the course of a week. They are born in massive litters and subsist on the endlessly growing plants and bloated fruit of the mountain. Their thousands of corpses have made fertile ground for disease and insects.

ARTESSE, LAST SHAMAN OF THE MOUNTAIN
statistics as a 5th level magic user
Artesse is an elf of the old school: lambent red eyes and filed canines, deep black tattoos delineating strange geometries, emaciated body scored with scars. He is the oldest being on the mountain, older even than the God of the Earth. He was the high priest of Cybele when she lived, and he wants nothing more than to return the mountain to the way it was under her reign. To do that, he must acquire the divine seed in the God of the Earth’s heart and use to grow a new god, this one raised under his careful tutelage rather than the wind and wolves.
Artesse hates the Ecclesium. They killed his goddess and drove him away from his holy ground, leaving the infant God of the Earth to grow mad in its solitude. However, he is perfectly willing to negotiate with the party–he will reward them with a scroll of Speak with Animals if they provide him with the God’s heart, and is even willing to let them take the God’s head back to the Ecclesium to prove they killed him, with the understanding they will keep Artesse’s presence a secret.
The shaman can cast Invisibility, Animate Reptiles, Plant Growth, and Create Food and Water in addition to any other spells you see fit.

SACRIFICE BEARERS
Statistics as Bandit
Villagers from Braquefort desperate enough to risk the censure of the Ecclesium and dangers of the mountain. They are armed and each carries a squirming bag. Each contains a contains goat, with which the villagers hope to appease the God of the Earth. They will be hostile to anyone they come across–as far as they know, the only other people on the mountain are servants of the Ecclesium. If they are cornered, the villagers will release their goat, attracting the attention of mountain predators or the God himself.

VIGILANT BENBRACHES
Statistics as a 5th level Fighter; wears chain and wields a longsword
Vigilant Benbraches believes in sanitation and traffic laws as much as he believes in God, and he really believes in God. Even in the warped wilds of the mountaintop, he polishes his armor, shaves daily, and cooks nutritionally complete meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. This may indicate a man out of his depth, but Vigilant Benbraches has survived thus far on the mountain by his talent for spectacular acts of violence. He was in the area when the God of the Earth began attacking Braquefort, and climbed the mountain to deal kill the God without waiting for further instruction from the Ecclesium. If encountered, he will be polite and helpful if the party is working for the Ecclesium, and wordlessly hostile if they are not. Should their allegiance be uncertain, he will insist on escorting them off the mountain, forcibly if necessary.
Benbraches carries the blessed sword Galconda. None of the wounds it inflicts bleed, and the Ecclesium teaches that anyone killed by its blade are delivered unto the Heavens, redeemed in their final moments. Benbraches finds both of these characteristics pleasingly tidy.

AREAS

THE ASCENT
The most difficult to traverse part of the mountain: a 500 foot slope of scree and loose rock. Climbing checks without equipment are at disadvantage, and all climbers move half their normal rate. Failure sends the climber tumbling down the slope, taking d6 damage per 100 feet. Smart parties will lure the God of the Earth here.

THE SHAMAN’S HOUSE
A house built on the limbs of a great tree. Everything is covered with a poisonous powder, which causes anyone who comes in contact with it to hemorrhage from all orifices (DC 15 Constitution save or d6 damage/hour. Victim can make an additional save at the end of each short rest), because Artesse is not stupid and knows that the Ecclesium wants him dead.
His actual home is underneath the tree, accessible from a small hole between the tree’s roots. It is underground, reasonably warm and dry. A locked stone casket contains a scroll of Speak with Animals. A random philtre and a lesser ester sit on a crude table. Artesse also keeps his Gallows Prophet here. It is a four-foot tall mummified corpse, proportioned like an adult, with a noose tried around its neck. If strung up on a gallows or tree, it can Detect Magic on everything in a 13 mile radius and report the results back to its owner. It can also make Arcana checks with a +5 bonus. The Ecclesium will want it burned.

THE GOD’S CAVE

70% chance the God is here when the party enters. Roll on the encounter table as normal.
when the party enters. Filled with bones, rotting viscera, and piles of shit. Scattered beneath the mess are 10d100 copper pieces worth of jewelry, the former possessions of the God’s many victims. There are d6 Rare ingredients of the same type here, as well. Major structural damage to the back of the save will open up vents of toxic vapor, which inflict the Poisoned condition on anyone who breathes them. After d6 Rounds of direct exposure, the sufferer must make a DC 10 Constitution save or be paralyzed until removed from the gas cloud.

The God’s smell/influence is overpowering here; animals become hostile to their masters, and intelligence creatures must make a DC 10 Wisdom save or be frightened of the God for a round. They must make the save every round they are in the cave.

CYBELE’S TREE
50% chance the God is here when the party arrives. Roll on the encounter table as normal.
A large, dead oak on the edge of a cliff face. Everything here is dead and withered, and the animals avoid this place. If the God is here, he will be some distance from the tree, screaming, weeping, and throwing stones at it. He will not come closer unless provoked by someone near the tree.
The tree can be safely destroyed by harvesting the Grand Poison ester inside of it. This turns the tree to dust. Otherwise, harming the tree releases sprays of poisonous ichor (all within 10 feet of the tree must make a DC 12 Dexterity save or take d6 poison damage). This ichor deals double damage to the God of the Earth.

AFTERWARDS

If the party kills the God of the Earth, all vegetation on and around the mountain will wither and all soil nearby will turn to dust without his influence within months. This will end Braquefort as a habitable town. The Ecclesium will reward the party and blame the blight on the God’s curse.
If the party destroys Cybele’s tree, the God of the Earth will become less violent. The mountain will become a verdant, wild place: still dangerous, but without the riot of telluric forces warping flora and fauna. The villagers will continue to propitiate the God, and the Ecclesium will send inquisitors to destroy the heresy, investigate the party’s failure, and kill the God of the Earth for good.
If the party kills the God of the Earth and gives the god-seed to Artesse (or plants it themselves), it will grow into another divinity. Artesse will raise it to be more circumspect that the God of the Earth, but it will be no friend to mankind. If the seed is planted and abandoned, it will grow into another beast like the God. If the party raises it, use your imagination.